Use of figurines, 'playscape,' spurs early literacy

Mollie Cohen, 8, right, reads to her little brother Asher Cohen, 5, in the Early Literacy Play Area on Tuesday at the Louisville Public Library.
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JEREMY PAPASSO
)

At just 20 months old, Emery Ossenfort is setting herself up to be a reader.

Ossenfort played with wooden trains, zebras and other figurines at the Louisville Public Library last month at the library's new "playscape" station.

Her nanny, Kelley Ryan, helped her make up stories about what the animals were doing. When Ossenfort exhausted that, she wandered over to a toy that looks like the dashboard of a car, complete with a bright red steering wheel and shifts.

"This just enhances their imagination," Ryan said of the playscape. "The earlier they can learn words, the sooner they can put sentences together and start sounding out words."

The transportation-themed station is meant to get parents and children interacting with each other, creating their own stories about the items.

The playscape table will change about every four months and will also feature a reading nook with a tent in which children can read, and alphabet magnets to play with. A third playscape will feature a kids' kitchenette, a cleaning set with a vacuum and other items for a domestic environment.

"Imaginative play is a really great way to teach narrative skills like knowing parts of a story, characters and plot," said Adrienne Gass, a children's librarian at the Louisville Public Library, 951 Spruce St.

Ryan said that Ossenfort regularly visits the library for story time and other activities. The playscape enhances what she's already learning.

"She has a great imagination. We've been talking to her so much," Ryan said, adding that the toddler knows her colors and loves making up stories with toys at home. "She's a smart cookie."

The playscape is just one part of the library's push to promote early literacy skills in children from birth to age five, which stems from the Every Child Ready to Read program, a project of the Public Library Association and the Association for Library Service to Children.

The program, which came out in 2004 and was re-evaluated years later, encourages five activities to help prepare children to read including talking, singing, reading, writing and playing.

Gass and children's librarian Kristen Bodine put together early literacy kits for babies and toddlers that focus on each of those activities, incorporating fun toys, books and other items to entice kids to try it out.

For example, the toddlers' reading kit features the popular children's book, "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie," by Laura Numeroff, and includes a hand puppet and soft, cloth props to go with the story to promote interaction. The babies' reading kit includes board books. Some, like "Goodnight Moon," by Margaret Wise Brown, have a storyline, while others, like Tana Hoban's "What Is That?" employ only pictures to promote talking with babies.

Talking kits include a plastic microphone that echoes and recording devices for kids to easily record messages and play them back. The writing kits feature tactile alphabet letters, dry erase boards and items to practice manual dexterity.

"It's a really great way to get kids to enjoy books," Gass said. "You know, how do you make it fun? How do you make it engaging?"

Gass said it's important that parents interact with their children while they use the early literacy stations to help build the kids' skills that will prep them for reading.

"Oftentimes, you come in and see parents on the cell phone and kids are doing their own thing," Gass said, adding that she understands parents need down time, too. "But they're missing opportunities (to interact), so hopefully those props will help with that."

The early literacy kits were funded by the Louisville Public Library Foundation and will stay out all year in the children's area.

The Every Child Ready to Read program "stresses early literacy begins with the primary adults in a child's life," according to the program's website, everychildreadytoread.org.

It's important for adults to develop children's reading skills before they enter kindergarten so, when they do start school, kids can focus on actually learning to read, Gass said.

Pre-reading skills don't just include learning the sounds associated with letters or becoming comfortable with the alphabet and word families. Young children need to learn essential pre-reading skills like understanding that stories have a beginning, middle and ending, that text and pictures are different from each other, and even that a book has front and back covers and is read by turning pages from left to right.

Basic things, sure, but not for a little person who has never read a book.

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